


the world's not falling apart

by cirrus (themorninglark)



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Gen, POV Second Person, just a lot of twin feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-03
Updated: 2018-02-03
Packaged: 2019-03-13 00:52:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13559202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themorninglark/pseuds/cirrus
Summary: To be the twin of a kind and beautiful boy is to walk past thecombiniand turn to glance into the window.





	the world's not falling apart

**Author's Note:**

> I've been slowly growing these twin feels for many chapters. they finally found their way out :')  
> (inspired by Rebecca McClanahan's "Interstellar", a haunting essay about being a sister)

To be the twin of a kind and beautiful boy is to walk past the _combini_ and turn to glance into the window. He thinks you are looking for a drink, for food, for a tart lemon popsicle in the summer and a half-price bargain on _sushi_ sets as the day winds down. You know you are looking at yourself. You always know you are looking at yourself, even as you wear his face as yours; it looks nothing alike on you.

 _Good._ You tell yourself that, when he’s sunburnt and you’re not. He burns more easily because he prefers the shade, always slipping under shelters and trees when you’re walking down the street. There was a time you might have turned pink too, but your skin has grown used to this pricking and you drink in the sun with a smirk that makes him roll his eyes, and he has nowhere to hide because your family’s on a beach holiday and you want to see what it’s like to set and spike in the sand. He goes along with you, not because he is kind but because your grip on his wrist leaves him no choice. You’re magnanimous, and let him have the first serve. It is on this balmy afternoon that he first holds on to the ball for eight seconds, eight long, unforgiving seconds. His silence unfurls like your own breath heavy in your ears. Upon the wings of seagulls far above, there is a victory you could seize hold of if you jumped high enough.

He gets there before you do. The ball hits the sand and your toes with a sound so soft it’s swallowed by the salt-soaked breeze that whips in from the shore. You tip your chin up. From across the net, you can read his satisfaction as if it were pressed to your cheek.

It’s sentimental bullshit, the idea of twin telepathy. There is some amusement, nonetheless, in making people think you _can_ read each other’s minds: a shift in his gaze means he’s hungry, a tilt of his head means he’s bored, a narrowing of his eyes means he’s interested, except for the times it means he’s getting kind of annoyed. You are not reading his mind. You are reading his body, which is so like yours, so very like yours, except maybe a tiny bit taller and a tiny bit more _naturally talented_. You don’t really mind, because it gives you a perverse sort of joy to defy nature when you can.

To be the twin of a kind boy is to take his pudding when he is in the bath and finish it before he gets out. You swear in your head that you will replace it. You mean to. He always buys more before you can, like he can’t get enough, or knows _you_ can’t and has resigned himself to this. You sputter out some kind of half-assed self-defense when he wanders into the kitchen, still towelling dry his hair. He fixes you with a wordless gaze that twines around your pinky finger and makes you want to swallow the entire plastic spoon.

A pain in your hand is not a pain in his. You learn, early and pragmatically, that the two of you are not identical that way, and so when your parents dress you alike and take you to youth volleyball camp it is you who ties your shoelaces faster, you who runs further than everyone else, you who stays behind for extra practice and lands funny, your knees buckling as you cushion your fall with bruising palms. At the sound of his footstep you look up into his face, that face that is yours and not yours and lips pressed together with Pocari Sweat still glistening on them, and he leans down to take your hand without asking. Years will go by and he will continue not to ask. You never get to choose if he is there, there to pick you up, there to spike your toss. You can ask, but it is he who makes the choice.

Aran thinks it is in a fit of individualistic pique that you first go blond. Aran is right, and he is not.

To be the twin of a beautiful boy is to take a pair of scissors to your hair, hold it up so the bathroom light glints off the blades, the _twin blades_ , and idly visualise a chunk of your fringe falling away between your fingers. It is feeling the weight of an arm settle without warning across your shoulders and a sigh like a hum at your earlobe and a tiny frown appearing in the mirror. He does not need to ask what you are doing. You go to the salon together that afternoon and pick each other’s colours, because you know with the certainty of that sun burning in your throat that he will know the best colour for you, and you for him.

In a rare moment of clarity, you will wonder: does he ever think that you only eat the pudding because it is his, that you only wear that jacket because it is his, that you only take the things that will start a war? Is that what he thinks? And then, with a smile that you will never share with him: _does it matter?_

When you say you do not care if everyone hates you, it does not occur to you that what you really mean is _everyone, everyone but you_. It does not occur to you at all. If it had, you’d sooner smother him in your sleep than say it out loud. It’s a mercy you cannot smother each other in your sleep, for the bunk beds had appeared in your room when you were ten. You’d both clamoured for them because you wanted to climb a ladder and write your name across the ceiling. He, _his_ name, and you, _yours_ ; at least, that’s what you assume. To anyone else who looks, it’s still white and pristine up there. They do not see the mess you have carved into the plaster with your voices when you argue, the dozens upon dozens of ways you have shaped each other’s names, and more. In the end, it is he who gets to sleep in the upper bunk. You realise, but will never admit, that you do not mind it so much because it means he cannot get out of bed without you knowing, he cannot leave without you knowing.

To be the twin of a boy is to look away from the window of the _combini_ , a lilting curl in the corner of your mouth that was bright in the heat of the afternoon. Now, in the silken dark, it is a reflection sharp as the crescent moon. You are a reflection. He is a reflection. You wonder which of you is the source of light, and as you step inside the store and follow him to the dessert section, you can’t shake the feeling that you’ve always known.


End file.
